The Cavaquinho

The cavaquinho /kav-uh-keen-oo/ is a Portuguese instrument that traveled to Brazil, Hawaii, and many other countries. 

The cavaquinho is very similar to the ukulele. It has the same body shape and has four strings. However, it has flattened frets and metal strings, where the ukulele has raised frets and typically uses nylon strings. The cavaquinho can be tuned in several different ways. Two standard tunings are DGBD or DGBE, which correlates with the last four strings of the guitar.  

The cavaquinho is also strongly associated with Brazil. This is because when the Portuguese immigrated to Brazil with the cavaquinho, the instrument kept its name. The cavaquinho, quite literally, grew in Brazil. The body of the instrument was changed to a bigger size. The typical Brazilian tuning is DGBD, while the Portuguese tuning, I believe, is DGBE. However, there are more than two ways to tune your cavaquinho. Some alternate tunings include DABE, GGBD, GDAE (mandolin tuning), and GCEA (ukulele tuning). Choro and samba music are commonly played with the cavaquinho in Brazil.  

In Hawaii, the cavaquinho sparked the creation of the ukulele. They both have the same body shape and four strings. However, the cavaquinho has flattened frets and metal strings, where the ukulele has raised frets and typically uses nylon strings. The ukulele stays in one tuning, but the cavaquinho has multiple, including the ukulele's, GCEA.